Stay with Me (25 page)

My brows knitted. “Why?”

“I thought maybe if I’d been home, I could’ve stopped her,” he replied. “Hell, a part of me still thinks that.”

“You can’t help people unless they want to be helped,” I told him. “Trust me. I know.”

“I know you do,” came his quiet response. “But that’s some guilt I’ll probably carry with me for a while, if not forever. She was . . . she was my little sister. It was my job to keep her safe.”

“Oh Jax,” I whispered. The knot was bigger in my throat. “I’m so sorry,” I said, and I knew it sounded lame, but I didn’t know what else to say.

His thumb did another pass and then his hand moved away. “There’s nothing you need to apologize for.”

“I know.” A moment passed as I dragged in a deep breath, and then I rolled back onto my other side, facing the closet door again. My heart ached for him and his family and a sister that never had a chance to become anything. We didn’t have the same past. No way. But there was a similarity there. Mom was who she was today because she couldn’t get past the grief and heartache, and I wondered, if Jax knew about the pageants, then did he know about the fire and about Kevin and Tommy? “I’m sorry you lost your sister and what you experienced overseas. You . . . you must be very brave.”

“I think it was more of not wanting to die or to see my friends die than it was being brave.”

That was a very modest thing to say. Since he shared so much with me, I felt like I needed to share something really unknown about me, but it was hard. It took a bit to get my tongue to form the words. “I’m a liar.”

There was a pause and then, “What?”

Even though it was dark, my face filled with blood. “I’m a liar. My friends back home—Teresa and her boyfriend Jase, and Avery and Cam. Cam’s Teresa’s older brother, and him and Avery are like the cutest couple in the world,” I rambled on, nervous. “Cam has a pet tortoise and he got Avery one.”

His body shook with a quiet laugh. “Their turtles are in love?”

“Yep. You can’t help but feel the love when you’re around them; not even the turtles are immune to it.” And I kept going. “Teresa and Jase are like the hottest couple in the world. Seriously. Then there’s Brandon.”

Another moment passed. “Brandon?”

Probably shouldn’t have brought him up. “He’s another friend. He has a girlfriend,” I added quickly and then moved right along. “Anyway, they’re great. They really are, and I love them, but I’ve lied to them. They know nothing about me and I’ve told them so many lies.”

“Babe . . .”

“No. Seriously. I’ve told them that Mom was dead.” When there was silence, I made a face at myself in the dark. “See? That’s a horrible lie. But there was never any chance that they were going to meet her and in a way, she is kind of dead, you know? The drinking and the drugs killed my mom years ago.”

“I see,” he murmured.

I wasn’t sure if he did. “And they think I’m visiting extended family right now.”

“That’s not a lie. Clyde is like family.”

My mouth opened to correct him, but he was right. Huh. “Last semester, I told Teresa I was going home for break and you know what I did, Jax?”

“What?” was his soft reply.

“I stayed in a hotel and ate room service.” When he didn’t respond, I added, “The room service was really good, though.”

“You’re not a liar,” he said after a few moments.

“Um, what part of this convo did you miss? I’ve lied to them. On purpose.” And now that I really talked about it, I felt like a total tool for it.

“You had your reasons, Calla. You weren’t lying to be a bitch or whatever. You didn’t have a great childhood and your relationship with your mom is nonexistent at best. I’m sure your friends would understand if they knew the truth.” He paused. “And everyone has secrets, babe. Not one person is always a hundred percent honest in every single situation. And that goes for your friends.”

I closed my eyes as his words sank in and there was no denying that they helped make me feel a little better about all I’d kept from my friends. “Thank you.”

He didn’t say anything for a few and then he shifted again. His legs were most definitely touching mine. “Calla?”

My breath caught once more. “Yeah?”

After a beat of silence, he asked, “So you think I have great lips?”

“Oh my God,” I groaned, forgetting I’d said that earlier. Jax’s laugh danced over my skin, and just like that, everything felt okay. “I hate you.”

He chuckled again. “No, you don’t.”

The room was dark, so I smiled, and I knew he didn’t see it, but I had a feeling he knew I was smiling and he was right. I didn’t hate him.

“Calla?”

“Jax?” I had no idea what he was going to say next.

He touched my hair, or I thought he had. It was so light and so brief, I wasn’t sure, and then he said, “You have to be very brave, too.”

I drew in a soft breath. “About what?”

Jax didn’t answer, and I didn’t push it, because I was afraid he would expand on that statement, and I wasn’t even sure why I was afraid. After a while, I heard his breathing deepen and I knew he was asleep, and I lay beside him, feeling the knot in my chest now. It was a long time before my thoughts settled from what he’d told me, what he’d shared and said. And from everything else I hadn’t told him.

W
aking up the second time next to Jax James was like waking up the first time. He was most definitely a cuddler while he slept.

When I finally fell asleep, his thighs were against the back of mine, but it hadn’t been like this. His entire front was flush with my back, and not only that, one of his legs was thrust between mine, and his arm was curled around my waist. Our heads had to be sharing the same pillow because his warm breath stirred the hair along my temple and danced across my cheek.

We were spooning again.

And it felt just as good and as dumb as the last time, but a good kind of dumb. A dumb I wanted to play around in, because his body heat had created this snuggly cocoon I didn’t want to part with, but I remembered what happened last time.

Drawing in a deep breath, I started to basically throw myself away from Jax and off the bed, but that didn’t happen. The moment I moved, the arm on my waist tightened, and suddenly I was rolled onto my back.

Jax tossed his leg over mine and he moved in—no, he
snuggled
in. When he spoke, his lips brushed the side of my neck, sending a wave of goose bumps across my flush. “Where do you think you’re going?”

Oh wow. His voice, deep and rough with sleep, and mixed with the fact his lips brushed my skin as he spoke, was a wildly alluring combination. My heart skipped, kicking up my pulse.

“I . . . I was getting up.”

“Mmm,” he murmured, sliding his hand across my stomach and up, to where it rested just below my breasts. I bit down on my lip as a sharp sensation crowded my insides. His hand was way close and if he spread his fingers, his thumb would most definitely be getting some action. “You don’t understand the concept of sleepy time.”

My eyes were wide and fixed on the ceiling. I knew I should move his hand. I didn’t think he could feel any difference in my skin through the borrowed shirt and tank top, but a nervous energy built in my stomach, mingling with a feeling I recognized.

I’d never been laid, sexed up, or whatever. Obviously. But I was as curious as any girl who’d gone through puberty and whatnot, so I’d gotten familiar with my body more than a few times, and I knew what that
edginess
was zinging through my veins.

“Do you?” he asked.

“I . . .” My tongue stopped moving because that was when his hand moved just the slightest and his fingers spread. His thumb brushed against the under swell of my left breast, and I jerked in reflex. I don’t know if it had to do with the scarring or not, but my left breast was waaay sensitive.

His hand was still after that. Waiting. Instinct told me Jax knew exactly what his thumb had brushed against and now he was waiting to see how I responded. Or maybe he was copping a sleepy feel without realizing.

Jax’s lips brushed a surprisingly hot spot just below my ear, and the air went right out of my lungs.
Wow
. Okay. He was probably not copping a sleepy feel and knew exactly what he was doing.

I needed to remove his hand.

I needed to get the hell out of this bed.

But I didn’t move.

And whatever answer he was waiting for, he must’ve gotten it. His thumb drifted along the swell of my breast, and my throat dried. Holy hotness, what were we doing?

“Forget about sleepy time,” he said, moving his lips against the skin of my throat again. “I think I like the fact you don’t understand it.”

“You do?”

That thumb went up about half an inch, and I bit down on my lower lip. “Yeah. I like you waking up.”

I had no idea what to say to that, and my lashes were slowly, but surely, lowering, even as my heart was picking up its beat and warmth was invading my body, easing out the tautness in my muscles at the same time it was building a different type of tension.

“You know what’s going on here.” His statement caused my eyes to open wide once more. There was a beat. “Please tell me you understand what’s going down here.”

“Yes,” I whispered, and then I said, “No.”

“Yes and no?” His voice had gotten deeper, rougher. Tingles danced from the tips of my breasts down to my belly and lower, much lower. “Care to explain?”

“Why?” It was all I could say.

Those lips skated along the side of my throat. “Why what?”

I was having trouble forming thoughts. I’d never been touched like this before, and it was barely a touch, but he had my senses spinning. “Why is this going down?”

“Because I want to.” His thumb glided again.

That wasn’t an answer. “But why?”

“I’ve already told you.” He pressed his lips against my pulse, causing me to gasp, and then he lifted his head, resting his weight on the arm next to my side. He stared down at me, his look intense. “It’s the same reason behind why I’m taking you out to dinner tomorrow night.”

My eyes were locked on his and my heart was pounding like it was stuck in a steel drum. That damn thumb of his was on the move again, evoking another wave of tingles.

“I like you, Calla,” he said in a voice barely above a whisper.

I changed up my next question. “But
how
?”

Jax blinked.

The one word change sounded pathetic even to my own ears, but I seriously didn’t get it. Half of my face was good. Half
wasn’t
. He hadn’t even seen the rest of me, and he was the kind of guy you wrote home about to your mom, your dad, and every single person you know. And I wasn’t sure if he’d known me long enough to even judge what kind of personality I had or—God, I couldn’t believe I was even going to think this—if I was rocking some inner beauty or not.

“What?” he said, eyes narrowing.

A different kind of heat crept into my cheeks. “I’m a realist, okay? I have been for a long time. I
need
to be, and you liking me—wanting to take me out on a date and do—”

“Really fun and interesting things to you,” he supplied.

I flushed. “Yeah, that.”

“Naughty things that are going to make you feel so good,” Jax continued, and his words and the way he spoke them turned me on like I’d never been before. “That’s what I want to do to you.”

“Okay,” I breathed. “I get that.”

One side of his lips kicked up. “Good.”

“But it doesn’t make sense,” I pushed on as I fisted handfuls of the blanket. “You’re hot and—”

“Well, thank you.”

I ignored that and tried desperately to ignore how his hand was almost entirely cupping my left breast. I didn’t want to think about that, because it made me think that if I weren’t covered up, he wouldn’t be doing what he was doing now. I drew in a deep breath. “I’m not hot. I’m not—”

My words ended because he dipped his head and his lips brushed mine. “We’ve had this conversation before,” he said, moving his mouth over mine. “And I’ve told you I wouldn’t kiss a girl I didn’t find attractive.”

“But you said that wasn’t a real kiss.”

“It wasn’t. This is.”

And then Jax kissed me, like really kissed me. His lips pressed against mine, moving as if he was getting himself familiar with the layout of them. My fingers unclenched from the blanket and I placed them on his chest, just below his throat, to push him off. His skin was hot and hard and rough. It felt different, but before I could really investigate that, he caught my lower lip between his teeth and nipped. I gasped at the unexpected bite and the rush of sensations erupting. He took advantage of that and deepened the kiss, slipping inside me, and I was no longer thinking about pushing him off.

The kiss . . . it was wet and deep and it wasn’t good or nice. It was great and everything the romance books claimed kisses were. Jax
tasted
me. There were no other words to describe that kind of kiss. Not when he slanted his head and touched his tongue to mine. Not when he flicked his tongue along the roof of my mouth, dragging up a throaty moan from deep within me.

Jax pulled back to say, “I like that sound. Fuck. I love that sound.”

My eyes stayed closed as my lips tingled. “I . . . I didn’t know you could be kissed like that.”

“Hell,” he groaned.

He kissed me again, and it was just as great as the one before, but this . . . this kiss turned into something more. The hand that had almost been cupping my breast was now seriously cupping my breast, and my body moved on its own. My back arched, and I made that sound again, and he seemed to really like it again, because there was a rich, decadent growl that rumbled through him. Then his fingers moved on my breast, and that damn, skilled thumb of his found the tip of my breast with unnerving accuracy. My head thrust back into the pillow, and his mouth followed me, nipping and kissing as his thumb smoothed over the hardened peak.

His lower body shifted under the covers, settling over mine. Using his thigh, he eased my legs apart and slipped in-between them. I gasped into his mouth as a sharp dart of pleasure pounded through me, centering into one spot.